Forums Viewable to Guests

[David]

Leading quote of argument to gain perspective:

You can see the forum and the sections, etc. Just not the threads. Thats why you got to register to make posts, view threads, etc. It's a simple 3 mins?

Are your forums viewable to guests? (please don't confuse it with the board index). If not, then why?

In my experience, the forums that don't do well as the ones where you have to sign up in order to see the contents within the forum. People want to see the quality of the community prior to signing up and if they can't, they will most likely just move on. You don't have to allow guests to post, but guests should be able to see what's in the forum. I can't really think of a large successful forum that restricts guests.

Another reason/excuse is that people "think" it's a way for people to sign up. In all my time with online marketing, that never works in the long run. People aren't going to willingly sign up just because your forum is not viewable to guests. In theory it sounds decent, but in practice, it never works out right.

 

[Deleted member 5665]

You only made this thread cuz what I said. 😛 Don't gotta turn it into a debate. :lol:

 

[Nebulous]

Yep. People need to browse the forum to get a feel for what they are getting theirselves into.

 

[Joe 2]

Yep. People need to browse the forum to get a feel for what they are getting theirselves into.

Agree.

Over at Forum Stylization you can see all boards and read all topics that regular members can as a guest. I think only certain things guests can't do. Like view the member list, etc. Though they really have no reason doing so anyway.

 

[Deleted member 5665]

You can see all boards on my forum to. Just not the viewthreads. :lol:

 

[kasem]

Yep. People need to browse the forum to get a feel for what they are getting theirselves into.

Agree.

Over at Forum Stylization you can see all boards and read all topics that regular members can as a guest. I think only certain things guests can't do. Like view the member list, etc. Though they really have no reason doing so anyway.

Most forums have that (it's the default of forum softwares)

I don't see why you would let it be viewable by guests, doesn't that mean bots can't crawl it??

 

[Nebulous]

I can see the logic behind people wanting to make their topics/posts non-viewable to guests. I suppose they think that their memberships will increase because people will join to see whats being said on that forum.

However in most cases it has the opposite effect. Some people will not blindly join a forum that they cannot view. A lot of people will browse forums for a while.. See how the members/staff interact with each other, what kind of topics / posts there are, to make a judgment on whether or not the community is full of conflict or harmony, etc, etc, etc.

 

[Deleted member 7467]

I don't see why guests shouldn't be allowed to see the content inside forums. If the staff keeps everything that goes against their sites ToS, than there should be nothing to hide. Staff forums and VIP sections are excluded from that though. If an actual member isn't allowed to see it, than neither should a guest be allowed. Just common sense.

 

[David]

You only made this thread cuz what I said. 😛 Don't gotta turn it into a debate. :lol:

Please don't take it as personal or aimed at you. I needed to make sure people got the perspective right. Anyway, it's good discussion 🙂

 

[katy perry is hot]

Definitely allow them to view all areas. I had a mod on my old site that made it so you can view 10 topics as a guest and then had to register.

 

[Pixel Pirate]

On my community all forums are viewable except the select few.

 

[Cosmic]

You are basically destroying your forum by not making threads viewable. Think how you found a lot of the forums you are using (the big ones, not the FP ones). You probably use Google. The reason why I registered on Digital Point was because I got help from them via Google about 10+ times. Forums are not just meant to be posted on, but they are meant to be read, especially ones with more intellectual topics (say, programming).

 

[el canadiano]

It depends, though. There are some forums where it benefits from hiding things to guests, such as a doc about "XYZ" (generic name).

 

[Ashish92]

forums hidden from guests often turn their intentions to register of.. so it's better to not allow guests to post but allow them to see 🙂

 

[Grumpy]

On my old forum I owned ages ago, everything apart from VIP lounge and Staff Room was guest viewable.

 

[AnAccount]

Yep. People need to browse the forum to get a feel for what they are getting theirselves into.

I agree. The only things I would make unviewable to guests (if unviewable is even a word lol) would be graphics. In fact, now that Marie 1988 (my own forum) has an RPG section, I"m thinking of hiding that from guests as well, so just in case we decide to hold writing competitions and stuff like that, people's efforts won't be stolen.

 

[David]

Cheers for the responses. Any more input?